Ignoble Truths

Ignoble Truths

In 2015, Perry Teeters and I decided to hike from Mexico to Canada on the Pacific Crest Trail. Shortly before embarking on this insanity, I bounced into Buddhism's Four Noble Truths. I found them interesting and decided to deliberately avoid reading about the noble truths, hoping to discover, in what would become a four month walking meditation, my own interpretation.
Boy, was I in for a surprise. Although we only finished 1400 miles of the trail, these four simple sentences spoke volumes. I discovered that what Buddha, or Siddhartha Gautama, taught was not so much a religion as it was a psychology. In 2006, a Buddhist scholar, Tenzin Wangyal, wrote an article where he said, “If the Buddha had lived in today's world, he would have simply written a self-help guide titled 'How to End Suffering.'”
I have since taken what I had learned and created this tale of a writer who meets an interesting character at a coffee shop, and begins an odyssey into the origin of suffering, how it keeps us from our happiness, and what we can do about it.
I hope this interpretation of the Buddha's teachings resonate within your heart the way they have within mine, and provide you with a degree of peace, contentment and happiness.
B. Gregory